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Saturday, September 8, 2012

Extension under wraps

8 Sept 2012: [Extension] The weather has been so good that there was no need to cover it overnight! We are expecting rain in the next week, the one in which we want to build the extension properly. At the moment it is being built in the garden as a pack of 12 cassettes which interlock.

The programme is to keep building the cassettes, then the 'wrecking crew' come on Weds to knock the wall down, and insert the beam, and then make good the opening. The extension is to be lifted in pieces and moved round to its final location, reassembled. Hopefully, it will be enclosed by the end of the week. Finishing work will take longer, and I am likely to do the roofing myself.

Note, South is to the right, This drawing is rotated to make the plans fit an A4 sheet best.

The plan is only to extend 950mm southwards, but that is all the site we have. It is extending the dining room, providing a large window to the south, a small window to the east (morning light) and a deep niche to the west for book shelves and storage.

The extension will generate more power than it will use. The power is to be stored in batteries.

15 June 2014: It has been a dry June so far with negligible rain. I'm glad to have 300litres of water storage for the garden. House ...

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Peveril Solar House

Welcome to Charging the Earth!

PEVERIL SOLAR is the first house in the UK to be entirely solar heated all year round! It is Carbon Net-Zero. It is an 'Active House' balancing inputs and outputs. PV generation and heating system consumption are in favourable balance using concepts of energy storage. Others claiming houses to be the first date from 2013 (and are unbuilt); this house exists and was carbon zero since 2011.

The name 'Charging' refers to 'storing energy underground': we have custom-built solar collectors, Surya Sunboxes, with ETFE front surfaces, to pump solar heat deep down into the earth. The building's heat pump gets all of this back in Realtime (immediately), Diurnially (later during the evenings) or Interseasonally (in Winter, months after the Summer).

Thus, we are augmenting the heatpump by storing long term heat in the summer, and we are defrosting the ground in winter-spring conditions, supplying solar energy directly to the heat pump, through its ground loop.

The five-way pentangle of Grid, Borehole, Heat pump, PV roof and Sunboxes have made the house Carbon Zero (for metered consumption). It's working, and we will continue to record data, to maintain that efficiency, and write it up in this website through to next year and beyond.

During theAutumn of 2012, we built a small house extension that is ultra insulated, with a higher energy gain than it loses.

Note, that we still have a net import of power from the Grid, because we still need power for lighting, cooking and appliances. But for the building emissions (as opposed to lifestyle emissions), we have achieved a credit balance of the regulated quantities, as recorded by meters.

The web-log follows the project from this general idea in Aug. 2009 to a technology of Surya Sunboxes, which seem to be effective - reducing energy costs of the house. Some of the Tabs will help you to get background and theory. You can click below to 'Follow Blog' to get email notifications - or email me. Please add Comments to the blog entries. If you find items in the Glossary that need explaining better, please ask. Thankyou!

Publications

Equipment sponsor

Kingspan, for Varisol Tubes

Equipment Sponsor

MG Renewables

Equipment sponsor

Ice Energy Heat Pumps

Equipment Sponsor

Holscot, for ETFE panels, re-fronting the Sunbox

About the Author...

David Nicholson-Cole is a Lecturer in Architecture at the University of Nottingham, with 35 years experience of architectural teaching and practice, which has included special interests in construction, building information modelling, tall building design and renewable energy technologies.

Finally, thanks to my deceased aunt, Margaret Cringle (1915-2008) whose legacy paid for most of the cost of this project - as one who was always turning lights out to save electricity, she would be very pleased!